Friday, November 4, 2011

This blog has been quite the journey for me. Ironically this journey that has been played out in a fairly public sphere has actually taken place most significantly inside of me. It has been a beautiful process to document how the Lord has helped me to grow as a person. I'm still weeding, but I can start to see progress in the garden of my heart.

I had a dream last night that I was attending a protest with thousands of people. In the crowd were people I know or have known at various points in my life...others I didn't recognize, but I felt connected to them in some way. We were defending something. It was like a sit-in or something. There was a wall too, and we were strengthening it up.

At the end of the dream, I knew that we had achieved our purpose. We were serenely congratulating each other. And as I was leaving, someone handed me a plastic ziploc bag that contained pages of things that I had written. They had been printed off and sewn together like sections of a book before being bound. Whoever handed it to me said, "You started this. So read what you've done and enjoy."

After all, every day we write the book, don't we? We either defend our portion of the wall or not. We hold the line of virtue and spiritual safety for our families or we do not. We buckle up for a sometimes bumpy ride and ride it out until our missions here on earth are finished.

Until that day comes, every day, we write the book...the book of our adventures here in life.

I am happy to share pages from my book with you and to read pages from your book here in blogland! Keep up the great work!

On Saturday, I shared with you my focus of going big by going small this month. Perhaps part of my dream was also making reference to that. Here are the winners of the 25 Free Christmas Photo Cards from Shutterfly...Thanks again for reading and for your comments and Christmas book suggestions:

Hello, Lydia, you spunky cartwheeling-chic, you! My dad served a mission in France, so maybe he can read your book suggestion to my kids this Christmas! Thanks!

That sounds wonderful, I hope you have a wonderful Christmas season :) I know a lovely book (or rather series) you and your children might enjoy--I grew up reading them, or rather admiring the beautiful illustrations. They're in French unfortunately, but the pictures really do tell the story. It's called "Martine, la nuit de Noël." Have fun sipping hot chocolate!

Holly, keep Roping 'em in, you cute mama! Me thinks that baby is not quite a baby any longer! Congrats on expecting #6! :) That book you were talking about is called "Christmas Day in the Morning"...one of my very favorites!!

My favorite post was when the children in Japan wrote thank you letters to your family for the care packages you had sent to them. They were so sweet, and a reminder that there are really little people there who were really affected by your service.

Looking Shutterfly ready, Audra! I really like your Christmas Blog on bringing our hearts to Christ during Christmas! I'm going to check out your book suggestion too! Thanks! Way to go on the Young Women Personal Progress work! That is very cool! (pat, pat, pat)

I don't have any huge accomplishments this year but I have been working on getting my YW Personal Progress along with my girls and have made lots of little accomplishments- My favorite was keeping my garden weed free this year (mostly) and growing enough for the first time that I actually had some to store!

Winners of the Shutterfly giveaway, please email me, so I can send you your code.

It is true that everyday we write a chapter in our lives. I love to journal and have done so for 34 years. I love reading your thoughts and you should for sure make your blog into a book. Blessings to you for a great read today.